Austin’s Story
Living with diabetes is far from easy, from checking your blood sugar five to eight times a day, to giving yourself insulin injections or changing an insulin pump site every three days (at least you’re supposed too...). I was diagnosed with type one diabetes at the age of two. Luckily, I was raised by wonderful parents who taught me very early on to be independent. They taught me how to give myself an injection at the age of four, when I wanted to learn, and how to count my carbs and draw my own insulin at six-years-old.
Throughout my life, I struggled tremendously with caring for my diabetes. Even though I grew up learning to take care of myself, I was tired of it. I didn’t want to check my blood sugar or give myself a shot. It didn’t help that I even had some friends whose parents wouldn’t let me spend the night because they didn’t want to take care of me. I wanted to be just like everyone else, but that wasn’t going to happen. I had given up on taking care of myself. I would lie to my parents about my sugars, and give myself insulin without counting carbs. I pretended like my diabetes didn’t exist. I had ketones seemingly all of the time, which affected my schooling, athletics, and made me feel absolutely terrible.
It wasn’t until my freshman year of high school that I realized what I had been doing to myself. I attended a summer camp called Camp Sweeney[https://www.campsweeney.org] for type one diabetics from the age of six to eighteen, where they taught us how to manage our diabetes. When I was younger, I attended Camp Sweeney for the fun and the relationships. It wasn’t until after I had an epiphany during my freshman year of high school, that I realized the true meaning of Camp Sweeney. It was to not view T1D as a handicap, but rather use it as a way to encourage others and show them that this disease isn’t a curse, but a blessing that can provide hope, love, and support to people that are going through the same journey. Diabetes is what you make it. It’s all a matter of perspective.
Since attending Camp Sweeney and making my way through my first few years as a college student and an adult, I found my passion in fitness, nutrition, and most importantly, diabetes. That’s what gave me the idea to start Everyday_T1D.[https://www.instagram.com/everyday_t1d/] I wanted to help inspire, and encourage other T1Ds to live their lives to the fullest, and to not let diabetes control them.During the summer of 2017, I had the chance to work as a counselor at Camp Sweeney. I had the opportunity to help instill the values, good habits, and education with the hopes that it will help make diabetes a little easier to manage and provide a community for kids who share the same burden. I have decided that my career path should reflect my passions. So I am pursuing a nutrition degree with the hopes of becoming a registered dietitian, and one day a diabetes educator.
Diabetes is what you make it. It is easy to neglect it, and pretend to not even have it. But the long-term effects of that are neuropathy, retinopathy, along with many other complications, and even death. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you are invincible, especially if you are young,because it will catch up to you. Change your perspective of what this disease is. Use it as a tool to give hope to those who have given up. Diabetes is a life-long disease, but with perseverance, faith, and courage we will endure.
Austin @Everyday_T1D